“Ideal Waist Size”: “Roll, Britannia” Is Now The Song Of The Day

LOOKS LIKE THE “BATTLE OF THE BULGE”, A TURNING POINT IN WORLD WAR II, WILL BE FOUGHT OVER A MUCH LONGER PERIOD OF TIME IN THE 21ST CENTURY…WE HAVE EXPOSED (OUCH) THE WEIGHTY ISSUES THAT OUR EUROPEAN BRETHREN ARE CONFRONTING ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE ATLANTIC (SEE POSTING ON GREECE AND EU)…AND GREAT BRITAIN NOW WANTS TO GRAB ITS SHARE OF THE GRIEF WITH “ROLL, BRITANNIA”…BRITISH MEN (SORRY DANIEL CRAIG AND DAVID GANDY) ARE PLOWING RIGHT BY THE LADIES IN OBESITY COUNT…READ AND WEEP THESE EXCERPTS:

“Men are notoriously bad at looking after their health and women are much more motivated.”

In addition, the number of overweight women has fallen in recent years while the number of morbidly obese men is rising sharply.

This comes as a new report by the Office for National Statistics uncovers wide discrepancies in men and women’s health and working lives.

Health experts believe the narrowing obesity gap shows how schemes to tackle the country’s weight problem are having less effect on men, with women more likely to go on diets or join a gym.

They warn that the country’s obesity epidemic, caused by an increase in consumption of junk food and a decline in exercise levels, will lead to increased levels of heart disease, diabetes and cancer.

Tam Fry of the National Obesity Forum said: “Men are notoriously bad at looking after their health and women are much more motivated. One would expect the signs of a decrease in women.

“But things are not getting better and if anything they are going to get much worse, unless dramatic steps are taken. We’ve been building up to this obesity problem for 25 years of more and it takes a huge amount of time to slow down and turn around.”

The figures, taken from the NHS’s Health Survey for England, are based on the Body Mass Index, calculated by dividing weight by height squared.

A BMI of 25 to 29 is classed as overweight, while over 30 is obese and anyone with a score over 40 is morbidly obese and in danger of causing serious damage to their health.

The statistics show that the proportion of obese men rose from 13 per cent in 1993 to 24 per cent in 2006. The number of morbidly obese men has risen from 0.2 per cent of the male population to 1.5 per cent over the same period, while 43 per cent are now overweight.

By contrast, the proportion of obese women over 16 rose from 16 per cent in 2003 to 24 per cent in 2004 and fell by a fraction the following year. The number of overweight women has fallen from 34 per cent to 32 per cent since 2004.

The ONS’s annual Focus on Gender report also showed the death rate from alcohol has doubled for men to 18.3 per 100,000 over the past 15 years, and risen from 5 to 8.8 for women.

Women can expect to live to 70.3 (and men to 67.9) but will spend their last six years in poor health or disability, it is claimed.